Bobby of the Labrador eBook

CHAPTER XI

WHEN THE ICEBERG TURNED

But the bear had spent its vitality, and as Bobby
sprang nimbly aside it fell at the very spot upon
which the young hunter had stood when he delivered
his last shot, struggled a little, gave a gasp or two,
and died. And when Jimmy came running up a moment
later Bobby with great pride was standing by the side
of his prostrate victim.

“We got him, Jimmy! We got him!”
said he in high glee, touching the carcass with his
toe.

“No chance of that at all,” declared Bobby
in his usual positive tone. “All I wanted
was time to load, and I knew I’d get him.”

“Well, I’m thankful you got him, instead
of he getting you, and I was afraid for a minute he
was going to get us both,” and Jimmy breathed
relief, as he placed his foot against the dead bear.
“My, but he’s a big one! I don’t
think I ever saw a bigger one!”

“He is a ripper!” admitted Bobby
proudly. “Won’t the folks be glad!”

And Bobby was justified in his pride. He had
fired upon the beast in the first instance, not through
the lust of killing but because he was prompted to
do so by the instinct of the hunter who lives upon
the product of his weapons. In this far northern
land it is the instinct of self-preservation to kill,
for here if man would live he must kill.

In Labrador they butcher wild animals for food just
as we butcher steers and sheep and hogs for food,
and the only difference is that the wild creature,
matching its instincts and fleetness and strength against
the hunter’s skill, has a reasonable chance
of escape, while our domestic animals, deprived of
liberty, are driven helpless to the slaughter.

In our kindlier clime the rich soil, too, produces
vegetables and fruits upon which we might do very
well, if necessary, without ever eating meat; but
in the bleak land where Bobby and Jimmy lived the summer
is short and the soil is barren, and there are no
vegetables, and no fruits save scattered berries on
the inland hillsides. And so it is that here
men must depend upon flesh and fish for their existence
and they must kill if they would live.

Every lad on The Labrador, therefore, is taught from
earliest youth to take pride in his profession of
hunter and trapper and fisherman—­for on
The Labrador every man is a professional hunter and
trapper and fisherman—­and to strive for
skill and the praise of his elders, and Bobby was
no exception to the rule.

And so it came about that Bobby at the age of thirteen
proved himself a bold and brave hunter, and standing
now over the carcass of his victim he felt a vast
and consistent pride in his success; for it was no
small achievement for a lad of his years to have killed,
single-handed and poorly armed, a full grown polar
bear. It was an accomplishment, indeed, in which
a grown man and a more experienced hunter than Bobby
might have taken pride; and a grown man could scarcely
have employed better tactics, or shown greater skill
and courage, after the first foolhardy shot had been
fired.